Assassin's Gambit
by K. Shrike
Summary: Casavir holds Bishop's life in his hands, Qara is tempted act on her contempt for Sand, and an assassin's web of manipulation closes about the spider herself. OC fill in.
1. Gamble

Kyria is the ranger/assassin with whom I played through the original campaign. I think this role suits her far better than that of hero of Neverwinter. All characters aside from Kyria are the property of Obsidian. I based this story in one of the "gaps" in the main campaign-- few well told stories of great length fill in every minute of the time they span-- so what do all of the PC's companions do in the gaps? And honestly, it didn't seem like Luskan tried hard enough at killing off that pesky Harborman to be believable, if she was such a threat. I had to fix that. I also edited this section when I realized I'd need a chapter title (having written another installment) and took the suggestion Anesor mentioned in a review.

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**Chapter 1: Gamble**

"Let's just say I have unfinished business with your ranger friend," Kyria's lips pulled themselves into a sly twist of a smile.

"I do not like the implications of this, for our leader's sake... and for my own," Casavir's gaze left the assassin, and floated upward toward the warehouse's ceiling.

"Oh come now, paladin. He's an evil man. Both you and I know it. Really, how hard can it be to say yes? I'll even do it for half price."

"I will not pay to end a man's life, even if he is..."

"Your rival? Say it, you know it's true."

Casavir's face contorted in anguish, and his eyes squeezed shut as though the pain were more than the pangs of jealousy.

"Casavir," she continued, taking on the semblance of concern, "there _is_ a real danger here. Stop and think about it. She's fallen prey to his charms-- it's obvious. And insofar as that, she is at least somewhat subject to his whims. He has his claws in her heart-- he'll twist. You remember _poor_ Malin at Port Llast, don't you? Did she ever tell you what Bishop manipulated her into _doing_?" This is too easy, she thought. He's so... trusting. Believing. Paladins. Ha.

Casavir's lip trembled, and his eyes locked with the assassin's. "Surely she... wouldn't..." he trailed off.

"Bishop's good. He... I do have a code, standards, whether you believe it or not," she drew to her mind the memory of her panther's death in order to feign the tears appropriate to the moment, as her glance shot down to the floor. "Bishop convinced me... to... to betray my family. He manipulated me into believing they... It's painful to talk about. He lied to me, and then laughed at my tears!"

Casavir reached out for Kyria's shoulder. Oh, he'd bought it hook, line and sinker.

"I just fear he'll do the same to her," she finished, and looked up to fully gauge the paladin's response.

"I fear as well."

"Just know that your decision here tonight may prevent a great evil."

"I..." the paladin faltered.

"You love her, don't you?" she prompted.

Casavir did not respond at first.

"Don't you want to protect her, keep her safe?" That barb found its mark-- Casavir's face contorted. Really, this was going to turn out to be an easy assignment. Garius would be pleased. Where her compatriots had failed, she would succeed. Torio was too in love with politics and public games to have won through, and Lorne, well, Lorne was too in love with blood. No, the way to accomplish the task was to splinter them, break them into factions, petty, bickering and distrustful of each other. Then she would strike at their leader's heart. But first, she simply had to find the weak points in their cohesion. Every group had such fault lines.

"Yes." Casavir hung his head.

"Don't worry. You made the right decision." She stood, and began to saunter to door. "If you wish, you can simply leave the payment with the captain of _The Siren's Kiss_."

Casavir's head snapped up. Damn it, that was not a good sign.

"I cannot. I _will_ not. No," there was a hint of steel in his voice.

She shouldn't have mentioned payment, she realized. _Damn _it _all_. "And what will you do about Bishop's grasp on your companion?"

"I will speak to her myself."

"It may already be too late... will she even believe you?" She was losing ground; the paladin was shaking his head.

Her earlier approach of Qara had surprisingly yielded no results-- could she risk losing the foothold that _this_ rivalry granted her? No... no, this was too great of an opportunity. But she had already made certain Bishop wasn't with his companions, that she might strike at him alone... She would take this gamble.

"Are you certain?"

"Yes, I am certain," the paladin responded, and moved as if to leave.

"Bad answer," Kyria drew her knives. She would ensure that Bishop took the fall for Casavir's death, and recriminations would ensue, splitting up their little band. Not as elegant as her initial idea, but hells, it would have to do.

Casavir wasn't as slow as she had anticipated. His blade rasped free of its sheath less than a second after hers. Damn, she'd have to watch for a lapse in his guard, and he had reach on her. She circled him for a moment, taking in his stance. Then she let one of her knives fly, a mere distraction. Casavir moved to block it, and she seized the opportunity to get in under his guard...

She was stopped by a change in the air currents. She hadn't heard it, but the there was a shift the air's movement, as though someone had opened a door. Instinctively, she dove and rolled away, just as an arrow whizzed by her face. She chanced a look at the warehouse door, and the archer who stood there. How ironic that it would be Bishop who came to the paladin's rescue, she smirked. This wasn't going to end well if she didn't get out of there, though.

Her movements would have to be erratic, as Bishop was leading his target with deadly precision... perhaps? She slipped in close to Casavir, under a swing angled to strike down through her shoulder and into her chest, turning sideways at the last moment, to strike once in an upward thrust under his pauldron. The paladin was now between her and the ranger. As she had hoped, Bishop held his fire. Using Casavir's tall frame as a shield, she danced backward as the paladin redirected his momentum into an upward cut that just missed her. She sprang suddenly to her right, into a crate, which she pushed off of to change direction. The tactic worked-- Bishop's next arrow harmlessly embedded itself in another wooden crate just behind her, and she took cover behind a large stack.

"Damn it all to the Nine Hells! Move your armored ass, paladin!" Bishop roared.

Casavir bolted after her, but Kyria was already weaving in between the piles of casks and barrels toward the warehouse's back door, the only other egress. Having staked out the site before hand, she had the advantage. She could hear the ranger and paladin struggling through the maze of stored goods. A parting gift, she heaved on a tower of barrels and listened as they knocked into other cases and crates, crashing like dominoes.

"Bishop, hold!" she heard the paladin shout amid the clatter before she darted from the building. Instead of seeking an alleyway, she leapt atop a rain barrel, grabbed the eave of the building, and hauled herself up. Flattening herself against the roof, she stilled her breathing to listen.

"You idiot!" she heard the ranger fume. "You got in the way of my shot!"

"Peace, ranger. The assassin cannot have gotten far. I must thank you, though. I underestimated you-- you came to my aid."

"Take your aid and choke on it. That bitch had been trailing me earlier. She smacks of Luskan."

"I see," Casavir's tone hardened. "Come, then." She heard the sound of retreating plate mail. She couldn't risk looking to see if Bishop had followed, but chanced a guess that he had. She'd guessed right, and so she set off across the roof in the opposite direction.

Well, she'd fared better than Lorne at least. But she knew the price of failure. Either time to find another way to kill that reeking whore of a Harborman, or put some distance between herself and Garius.


	2. Assurance

I initially didn't intend for this to continue, but my mind wouldn't let go of the questions, "what _did _happen when Kyria approached Qara? How off-kilter did that go?" And then... well, there was more. Kyria is my intellectual property, and all other characters belong to Obsidian.

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**Chapter 2: Assurance**

The day that Kyria had set her first plan into motion, she had been especially careful to time her ploy with a fight of grand proportions. Small bickerings occurred daily, but she needed near-fisticuffs. A week's worth of careful observation, and careful disguises, had finally yielded fruit.

"But of course, a princess too busy with her own imaginings of power couldn't be bothered to learn such trivial things as basic history. Believe me, I sympathize," Sand had landed his parting barb. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I'd like to check on my shop while we're in town and it's still intact."

He'd glided from the room and out the door of the Sunken Flagon with a smug half-smile on his lips, and though fuming, Qara had merely stormed across the floor to sulk in the corner instead. Kyria had waited until the common room had cleared before approaching the sorceress, to state simply, "I saw how that elf treated you earlier-- why didn't you just hit him? He certainly deserved it."

Qara's eyes had blazed for a moment. Then she'd spat, "Who asked you? You don't even know what I go through day to day with these cretins. They wouldn't know true power if it crawled down their throats and hatched!" She'd looked away, drawing her legs up to her chest, and then laid her face on top of the shelf her knees made. The picture in Kyria's memory was the very model of a petulant child.

"Their loss, then," Kyria had kept her statement short, closely watching the sorceress's reaction. The edges of Qara's had mouth turned up in a faint smile that caught the shadows from the firelight. Seeing this response, Kyria had pressed, "But you're not the type for hitting, are you? That's for people who haven't tasted magic..."

Qara's thoughtful look had not quite matched the sorceress's next words. "Yes, you're right. If I had my way, I'd bring that prick-eared book-slave's shop down around his head in a blaze that would light the city for weeks."

Kyria mirrored Qara's smile. "So what's stopping you?"

Something odd had played across Qara's face, then. Like a little girl, her arms had gone around her shins, and her face went back to resting on her knee-shelf. Kyria had assessed the damage. The little fire-flinger had obviously wanted the conversation to be over-- her entire body was closed, drawn in. Kyria had wondered how she had missed the mark on this one.

Another chink in the armor perhaps? "I see. Everyone feels conflicted, sometimes."

"I won't feel conflicted about torching off your eyebrows!"

She'd been so sure of this one. "I'm sorry. I'll leave you to your thought," and she'd retreated to the bar, then, to order a drink which she never actually touched. Better not to chance it. Not in the place they were strongest, no with their allies all about.

--

She paced the floor of her room. Everything was a disgusting shade of pale green-- the bedding worn, the curtains frayed; they all looked as though they had once been a richer hue, but time and moths had taken their toll. She was staying at a seedy inn just before the bridge to the Merchant's Quarter so that she wouldn't attract attention. She'd had changed her base of operations twice since she started this job. Twice she had been thwarted not by force of arms, but by her own misjudgement of her foes. Garius would not be pleased.

She ceased her prowling. Kyria was, after all, a visual thinker. She pulled her sand board from her pack and into the center of the floor before tipping a bag full of sand onto its surface. Writing anything down was far too risky a thing in her line of work. Even enchantments of secrecy on a parchment could be broken. But a monk had taught her something long ago, perhaps inadvertently. In sand there is impermanence. Ever since, she had had but one simple tool of planning, her sand board. Dirt and sand were plentiful-- the board was merely a tray to contain them. Her finger sufficed for a quill. Her hand erased all evidence.

She crossed off Qara/Sand after scrawling it in the dust. Then Casavir/Bishop. She circled Sand and Bishop next. She'd tried each attack from only one angle... Sand may yet be receptive. Bishop would not. He had made it plain he had seen her, and he had hit directly upon her affiliations. Would he warn the others? Unlikely. But taking too many chances was always bad business.

Qara was truly beyond Kyria's understanding. What had caused the girl to bristle so, at the merest suggestion she follow through with her desires? The sorceress was impulsive, uncontrolled, bursting with misplaced confidence. She should have jumped at the chance. Was it fear that held her back? Kyria could only speculate, and she realized that unless such speculations yielded another course of action, they were in vain.

Who else, then? Neeshka/Elanee. She added a question mark to that dichotomy. Grobnar? Perhaps... perhaps she could kill Grobnar, but that wouldn't create any tensions, or strain any relationships. Duncan. There was a thought. If Duncan were killed, to whom would the inn revert? She circled his name... and the hairs on her neck prickled.

She turned before she heard the words, her knives ready. A familiar form was framed in the doorway. "Well, well, who do we have here? I seem to remember a certain woman following me through the streets, and then running into her again while she was assualting a paladin. Now I bump into her when she seems to have taken up residence in an establishment I frequent. I think we're running out of coincidences, don't you?"


End file.
